Friday, October 05, 2012

Dawgs To Play Cocks With Bennett Out

The headline doesn't quite have the same zip as the legendary Lewis Grizzard headline from the mid 1960's. But, after the Dawgs take care of business in Columbia East tomorrow, we will all be a bunch of Happy Dicks.

This game is huge for both teams. I have read over at Get The Picture where some Dawg fans say this is the biggest game for UGA since the 1980 showdown with South Carolina that matched Herschel Walker against George Rogers. The Dawgs won that close game 13-10 and went on to an undefeated National Championship season. The comparisons are natural with both teams highly ranked and with both teams featuring national headline grabbing tailbacks - Marcus Lattimore for the Cocks and Gurshall (Todd Gurley/Keith Marshall) for the Dawgs. But, to me and from a Dawgs perspective, this game feels much more like the famous 2002 "Man Enough" game against Alabama in Tuscaloosa. Georgia is off to a 5-0 start and has looked pretty good in getting there but some doubt lingers about how tough this team is on defense and on the offensive line. In 2002, the Dawgs were 4-0 going into Tuscaloosa with the same doubts being bandied about and none more famously than when Pat Dye quipped that Georgia was not "Man Enough" to beat Alabama in Bryant-Denny Stadium.

So, here we are, ten years later, and the Dawgs have a major road test against a team that many wonder if we are tough enough to beat on the road. In 2002, the Dawgs out-rushed and out-passed Alabama and led the majority of the game until a late pick six put the Tide up by one. Then, in dramatic fashion, the Dawgs drove the field and won on a last second field goal by Billy Bennett. Tomorrow, we play the Cocks without our leading receiver, Michael Bennett, who we lost for the season on Tuesday with a torn ACL.

If Georgia is going to prove to be "Man Enough" tomorrow, the defense will have to come up with an answer for slowing down the guy who crushed our souls in the fourth quarter last year, Marcus Lattimore when he rushed for over half of his total of 178 yards. Lattimore is the type of back who seems to get stronger and stronger as the game goes on and this is discomforting considering the way a tired looking Georgia defense was gashed by Tennessee Rajion Neal in the fourth quarter last Saturday night.

If Georgia is going to prove to be "Man Enough" tomorrow, the offensive line will have to come up with answers for the devastating ends Jadaveon Clowney and Devin Taylor. At 6'-6" and 6'-8" respectively, these two will make it hard for Aaron Murray to throw over and around them when he is not running away from them. Among the many things that hurt the Dawgs in the game last year, it was probably Clowney's sack and forced fumble that was recovered for a TD that was the death blow. That play in the fourth quarter gave the Gamecocks a 10 point lead from which we never recovered. This year, the Clowney/Taylor duo account for 7 sacks and 13 tackles for loss.

If Georgia is going to prove to be "Man Enough" tomorrow, our special teams must play well and possibly must play perfectly. In last years 3 point loss to the Gamecocks, our special teams missed a 33 yard field goal and allowed a fake punt to go for a 68 yard touchdown. This year, our special teams have been up and down and our extra point kicking has been an adventure to say the least.

So what will Georgia do to prove it is "Man Enough"? On defense, the Dawgs will scheme to limit Marcus Lattimore. That means strong run support for the safeties and leaving the corners on islands in man coverage. On paper, Georgia's athletes on defense should be able to beat Carolina's athletes on offense. But we have to account for Spurrier's playcalling and adjustments. It will be critical for the Dawgs that Todd Grantham is on his A game in the coaching chess match. As much as we all hate Spurrier, he is crafty and resourceful. But, we should be better off in focusing on shutting down the run and challenging QB Connor Shaw to beat us with his arm. Shaw is a quite capable thrower and is also a running threat but his receivers are not nearly as dangerous as what we faced last week with Justin Hunter and Cordarelle Patterson. If we can't get to Shaw, like we couldn't get to Bray last week (until late in the 4th quarter) we could be in for a long day. Historically, the Cocks have hurt us with a tight end. Watch for that again. But, if the tight end is there best weapon tomorrow, it should bode well for the Dawgs. The worst case scenario is that they are able to remain balanced all day long between running and passing. Of course, the score of the game will dictate, to some degree, how they will call their offense so getting ahead of them early would be good to put pressure on Shaw and company.

So how do we get ahead of them early? Blame Bobo. Our offense will need to play wide open using all of its weapons and from all of its formations. We perform so much better when we are not conservative. It stinks that we lost Michael Bennett but the others will take up the slack. It is time now for Malcolm Mitchell to get back to being the receiver he was last season and the emergence of Marlon Brown as a clutch guy could make him the new preferred third down target. Then again, Chris Conley has made some clutch catches in his brief career as well. And let's not forget about our tight ends. But, we must also establish our running game. I believe that running the ball effectively and throwing the ball on typical running downs will help neutralize the pass rush of those bookends. It is on third and long that I worry about the matchups. For this reason, here is what I think is the whole key to the game... managing our offense to have lots of third and shorts (less than 3 yards) but when it is third and long, don't get too cute and be willing to accept that sometimes we will need to throw it away and live to fight another day.

I really wonder if we will continue to see big runs by Gurshall even against a defense as good as South Carolina. The best running back the Cocks have faced is Vanderbilt's Zac Stacy who they held to a 3.69 average on 13 carries. On the year, they are surrendering only 2.24 yards per carry. If we are going to run the ball well, we must keep them guessing by throwing on first down and by blocking better than we have all year. I think it is going to be tough sledding but I still expect to see our backs popping loose for a few runs of 20+ yards. It will certainly be great to see one or more of those turn into home runs like we saw last week.

Finally, and this is obvious and cliche but never more true... we cannot have the turnovers we gave away last year against the Cocks (and last week against UT in the second quarter) and we must have better average field position. I am sure that has been addressed all week so I will trust in our coaches and our players that we will do better in these areas.

I feel like this game is going to be one of maximum stress with much back and forth and a mighty struggle to pull away. But, I also feel like we are going to come home with a win. My guess... UGA 29 - S. Carolina 24.